“Get a lot of rest last night?”
I glanced over at Henry, who kept his face suspiciously blank. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Uh-huh.” Amusement pulled at his lips. “Must’ve been the wind then. Rattling the walls like that.”
Letting out a snort, I rammed my elbow into the side of his ribs. “Watch your mouth.”
He huffed out a laugh but bit back his retort as we crossed the threshold and entered Grant’s dining room.
Morning sunlight shone in through the windows and illuminated the grand paintings of forest scenes that covered the walls. We had already eaten breakfast separately earlier, so the massive table in the middle was bare except for the unlit candleholders placed down the middle. I scanned the people seated around it.
The only person who hadn’t arrived yet was Sienna. Everyone else was already seated. Grant sat in the lone chair at the head of the table, which I could tell irked Levi to no end. As if to make a point, he had taken a seat far down the side that Audrey and Paige were on. Malcolm and Sam sat on Grant’s other side, so Henry and I rounded the table and dropped down in the empty chairs beside them. It put me right opposite the King of Metal. He dragged his gaze to me but said nothing as I leaned back and crossed my arms.
A moment later, Sienna sauntered into the room. We all watched her as she strolled over to the windows and promptly took a seat on the windowsill. I resisted the urge to groan.
“Sienna,” Grant said. “Why don’t you come and join us at the table instead?”
She frowned at him. “Because I don’t want to. Honestly, if I had wanted to sit by the table, I would have sat there. But I don’t, so I’m not.”
“Please,” Henry interrupted before Malcolm could strangle her with his shadows. Meeting her gaze, he waved a hand around his ear. “You know my hearing is busted, so I can’t hear you properly when you’re all the way over there.”
It took great effort not to raise my eyebrows. There was absolutely nothing wrong with Henry’s hearing.
Sienna rolled her eyes, but then forced out a sigh. “Fine.”
Jumping down from the windowsill, she strode over to the table and plopped down in the empty chair next to me.
I glanced over at my friend, who just lifted his massive shoulders in a shrug. Damn, I really had to give him a raise.
“Excellent,” Malcolm began, and straightened the cuffs of his suit. “Now that we’re all here, and seated properly, we need to make a plan for how to proceed.”
“Look, I’ve agreed to help you out,” Levi began before anyone could so much as open their mouth. “But I don’t plan on getting my people killed needlessly in a war that frankly doesn’t concern me at all.”
Malcolm’s brown eyes sharpened as they locked on the metal mage. “Then why did you agree to come in the first place?”
He shrugged. “Because Callan and Audrey gave me something I wanted in exchange.”
“But you are still not willing to risk your people?”
“Needlessly? No.”
“How am I supposed to go into battle when I can’t even be sure that the people I fight with will have my back when the time comes? If you—”
“I agree with Arden,” Grant interrupted.
Anger flashed across Malcolm’s face as he snapped his gaze to the emotion mage. “I was not done speaking.”
“I don’t—”
“Guys,” Sam cut in. There was a pleading look in his gray eyes as he looked from face to face. “Please, enough with the fighting. We’re all on the same side.”
Malcolm clicked his tongue, but said nothing more. Grant only gave the shadow mage a slow smile. Opposite me, Levi flicked an assessing gaze over our healer.
When no one protested further, Sam went on. “Can we at least agree that open war is a bad idea?”
We all exchanged a glance, and then nodded in unison.
“Two armies facing off on an open battlefield is for people who have to play by the rules,” Audrey said. Flicking her long black hair behind her shoulder, she shrugged. “We don’t have to play fair.”
“Exactly.” Sam nodded vigorously. “So we do this in a way that minimizes casualties.”
Sienna’s citrine eyes burned like yellow flames in the morning sunlight as she grinned. “On our side, at least.”
From across the table, Levi let out a dark chuckle. “Agreed.”
I leaned forward in my seat. “And we also need to get the Blade of Equilibrium from the academy so that you, Levi, can destroy it.”
“And how do you propose we do that?” Malcolm asked, while arching a dark brow. “The academy is impenetrable. Not to mention that there is an army of constables currently standing between us and the city of Eldar.”
“What we need to do is to take out Quill and his parliament,” Audrey countered. Raising a hand, she waved it in the direction of the windows. “Not all of these constables.”
“Except all those constables are standing between us and Quill.”
“I know, but…” Blowing out a sigh, she fell silent.
I studied her while the others began arguing about the best way to get through the army and to reach Quill. With her head tilted slightly to the side, she drummed her fingers on the smooth wooden tabletop. I recognized that glint in her eyes. She was scheming.
While Malcolm tried to talk Sienna out of setting half the grasslands on fire, Audrey leaned closer to Paige and whispered something in her ear. The blond forger considered for a few seconds, then nodded. Then Audrey went back to tapping her fingers on the table again while staring out into nothingness.
“Careful with that tongue,” Levi said, a lethal edge to his voice. “I don’t appreciate you trying to give me orders.”
“I’m not trying to give you orders,” Sienna snapped back. “I’m just saying that if you’re here, you might as well do something useful.”
“He is doing something useful,” Malcolm cut in. “He has a hundred dark mages on the other side of this mansion, just waiting for his orders.”
Sienna stabbed her arm towards the windows. “Then give them the order to follow me out there and we can burn Quill to ashes before the end of the day.”
“Which part of ‘avoiding needless casualties among my people’ was difficult for you to understand?” Levi retorted in a voice that I knew meant that he was close to losing his cool any second.
Anger flashed in Sienna’s eyes. “Don’t talk to me as if I’m stupid.”
“Then don’t make suggestions that—”
“I have a plan.”
We all turned to look at Audrey. Her green eyes moved from face to face, meeting everyone’s gaze until the threat of violence had begun fading from the air.
“I have a plan,” she repeated when the tension in the room was gone. “We need to split into two teams. One small team will go into Eldar to get the Blade of Equilibrium while the rest stay here to keep Quill and his army occupied so that they won’t know what we’re doing until it’s too late.”
Grant arched an eyebrow at her. “And what exactly are we doing?”
“I’m getting to that part.”
Looks of skepticism were replaced by approval by the time that Audrey reached the end of her plan. I studied her as she at last leaned back in her seat again. Damn, she really was brilliant.
From her place next to me, Sienna grinned while her eyes glittered in the sun. “I like it.” Her long red hair rippled as she shrugged. “Well, as long as I get to be on the team that stays here and kills people while you go into Eldar to do all that.”
“I will stay here too,” Grant said. Amusement blew across his face as he shot a pointed look at the people around the table. “I don’t trust you degenerates in my home unsupervised.”
I snorted. “Fair.”
Sam sat up straighter. “I should also stay here. Since this is where the bulk of the fighting will take place, my skills will be most needed here.”
“That sounds good,” Audrey said before nodding towards Paige. “Paige and I will go to Eldar, since this is my plan and she has a lot of contacts in the criminal underworld.”
“Henry and I are coming too,” I announced.
A small smile played over her lips. “I suspected as much.”
I slid my gaze to Levi. “And you obviously need to come too, since you’re the one who’s gonna destroy the blade. But what about your people? Will you leave them all here to help with the fighting?”
For a few seconds, he said nothing. His calculating eyes only moved from face to face. “Do you need them?”
“Honestly? Yes.” Malcolm met his gaze with a frank expression on his features. “You saw what we will be facing out there. And losing Callan and Audrey cuts our battle strength quite drastically.”
Levi nodded to himself a couple of times and then sucked his teeth. “Alright. They’ll all stay here then.” His eyes locked on Malcolm again. “I’ll leave them under your command.”
The shadow mage blinked in surprise.
To be honest, shock flickered through my chest as well. Levi wasn’t exactly known for sharing command.
Leaning back nonchalantly in his chair, the King of Metal shrugged as if it was no big deal. “There needs to be one clear leader in a war, and from what I’ve seen since we arrived yesterday, you’re by far the most qualified one here.”
A lot of the previous hostility bled out of Malcolm’s eyes as he instead gave Levi a slow nod.
Levi dipped his chin briefly in acknowledgement too. “Remember what I said about needless casualties among my people, though.”
“Noted.”
“Alright,” Audrey said. “It’s settled then.” She turned to our host. “Grant, we’re going to need to borrow some horses. You have some here on your property, right?”
“Of course I do.” He raised his eyebrows and scoffed. “What kind of amateur do you take me for?”
She just waved off the comment. “Good. Then Paige, Callan, Henry, and Levi, get ready to leave. We’ll head out as soon as possible.”
“Careful with that tongue, poisonous snake.” Levi flashed her a sharp smile. “Wouldn’t want to catch you trying to give me orders, now would we?”
She just shot him an answering smile dripping with poison.
Huffing out something between a sigh and a chuckle, I shook my head and then pushed to my feet.
This had gone better than expected. No blood had been spilled during the meeting, and we had a plan to take down Quill and his whole parliament.
We were finally taking the fight to them.
